


i'm waking up to ash and dust

by callunavulgari



Series: Holiday Writing Challenge '12 [29]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Child Death, Death References, Episode: s05e13 The Diamond of the Day, F/F, F/M, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Multiple Pairings, POV Second Person, Redemption, Reincarnation, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-28
Updated: 2012-12-28
Packaged: 2017-11-22 19:01:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/613177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callunavulgari/pseuds/callunavulgari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I have done you a great wrong,” Merlin tells you, the third time you remember who you are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm waking up to ash and dust

**Author's Note:**

> Day 29 of the Holiday Writing Challenge on tumblr [over here](http://giraffe-tier.tumblr.com/post/35469673249/winter-drawing-writing-challenge). Prompt was 'power outage'. A day early, because I am impatient. This was supposed to be a KH day, but again, Merlin took over, namely Morgana feels. My poor baby.

“I have done you a great wrong,” Merlin tells you, the third time you remember who you are. You are curled with him atop your bed, frivolous things spread throughout your room—the porcelain dolls your father used to bring you from his trips overseas, the quilts that your mother had made for you over the years. The power had flickered off, when your mind had flooded with images of your first life—your magic swelling deep within you and bursting from your skin. Idly, you wonder just how much of England is without power.  
  
His hand is stroking through your hair, and the gesture has part of you recoiling in disgust, while the part of you that is still very much the you from this life relaxes into the touch. It feels like whiplash—like he has cleaved you in two.  
  
He is as you remember him, pale and elfin, and you think that were he granted the gift of death like the rest of you, he could live a life as your twin.  
  
“I’m sorry, Morgana,” he tells you, and the sweat has hardly cooled from his skin. Your nakedness is uncomfortable now in a way it hadn’t been before—because you _remember_. You remember hemlock and power beneath your fingertips and the feel of steel in your gut.  You feel wronged, somehow, like he has taken advantage of your blissful amnesia.  
  
“My name is Morgan Fay,” you tell him, and your voice quivers like a taut bowstring. “And I think you should leave.”  
  
.  
  
The second time you had remembered you had gone mad. There had been no Merlin in that life, just a baby with Mordred’s curls and the ice blue eyes that you both possessed. You had sobbed and sobbed, and in a fit of madness, smothered the child with a pillow in it’s first week of life.  
  
Your husband had been blind with rage when he’d found you sobbing, the tiny corpse cradled in your arms. You think that your magic could save you, perhaps, if only you could reach for it—  
  
His sword falls, and the grief—  
  
(is no more.)  
  
.  
  
The fourth time, you remember when your tongue is licking into Gwen’s cunt. She tastes glorious, something bright and lovely about the cleanness of her, and her hands are fisting in your curls when your memories come rushing in, filling up your head until you know nothing but hate and revenge and _hurt_.  
  
When you slip a finger inside of her, the tip of your tongue teasing her clit, she clenches around you, her orgasm shaking free of her as her back arches off your bed.  
  
You pull back, licking your lips, and she smiles at you.  
  
Helplessly, you smile back, ignoring the surge of malice deep inside you. Unbidden, your magic prickles at your fingers, whispering— _take what’s yours, take it, take it, take it_ —  
  
Gwen is yours, and she never notices the change in you until her own memories come, when you are both twenty-eight and happily married.  
  
.  
  
The fifth time, Merlin is with you again, as is Mordred.  
  
Mordred is almost your age in this life—you’ve been helping him pick out a university at the local library and Merlin is one of the librarians, a pair of spectacles perched on the bridge of his nose.  
  
Your fingers clench on the table as the memories burn through your veins, and your magic surges as it had when you had shaken apart beneath Merlin’s fingers. The bulb above your head explodes, and Mordred blinks at you. “Are you alright?” he asks, so very sweetly.   
  
You are reminded of the child you had smothered, the life that he had been denied, and you feel the grief as sharply as you had then. You smile at him, making excuses as you brush the glass from your sweater. It cuts your hands, blood welling up viscous and red. You stare at it for moments too long before you shake yourself out of it.  
  
He’s staring at you warily now, and you make your excuses before pushing away from the table.  
  
Your hands shake and Merlin watches you as you cross the library, eyes shrewd and blue and so very _ancient_.  
  
.  
  
“I am sorry,” he tells you, and you hiss.  
  
.  
  
“I should have told you,” he whispers like a secret. “I should have told all of you.”  
  
You think of what your life would have been like if he had—if perhaps you and Arthur could have saved him from Uther’s wrath—or if he would have died with a rope around his neck, too early to fulfill his destiny.  
  
You take a drag of your cigarette and breathe the smoke into his face. “Possibly,” you concede, because if you and Arthur had saved him, you think that you could have built Albion together—all four of you. It’s a child’s fancy that you don’t let yourself think about unless you are either very, very lonely or very, very drunk.  
  
He blinks at you, the cupids bow of his mouth turned downwards. He does not look all powerful like this, just another boy in a cafe wearing stupid clothing.  
  
You think about taking him to bed again, now that you remember who he is this time. The fun that you two could have with magic at your fingertips.  
  
Your lips curl and you dismiss the thought. Merlin’s love of Arthur is transparent even now—his king visible in every breath he takes.  
  
“Have you found him yet?” you ask him, because you want to see the hurt unfurl across his face.  
  
He does not disappoint, but the pain in his eyes makes embarrassment curl in your gut. “No,” he admits after a moment. “I have found all of you, time and time again, but never him.”  
  
You laugh at him, because the other option is to cry, and you will never let him see you cry. Not again. “You love him still, don’t you?” you ask, grinning.  
  
He regards you solemnly and inclines his head. “I fear I will be doomed to love him for the rest of time.”  
  
He walks away from you.  
  
You let him.  
  
.  
  
“Morgana, I’m sor—”  
  
“Come now, Merlin. We’re much too old to still hold grudges. I forgive you.”  
  
.  
  
Your name is Morgan. You have a last name, but you do not like to use it. You are the child of a scientist and a politician, and it is the seventeenth life that you have lived. The world is a different place than it once was, a palace of steel and glass, clouds obscuring the sky.  
  
Your world is on the brink of war and you and a boy you once knew stand hand in hand at the shoreline of a murky, polluted lake.  
  
A man meets you both there, still dripping lake water, his blonde hair plastered to his brow.  
  
His eyes are full of wonder, and beside you, Merlin is brimming with excitement.  
  
“Morgana,” the man says, inclining his head towards you. You nod back, smiling softly when Merlin’s hand tightens around yours. “Arthur,” you whisper, the name like ash on your lips.  
  
Arthur turns then to Merlin, his gaze softening. “Merlin,” he breathes, the name as sweet as a kiss.  
  
You think that Merlin might try to say Arthur’s name in return, but his voice chokes up around the word—a sob the only thing that makes it past his lips. “He missed you,” you tell Arthur in his stead, teasingly, and Merlin’s sobs only get louder.  
  
“Come now, Merlin, you’re much too old to be acting like this,” you whisper, nudging him with a hip.  
  
You let go of his hand only when Arthur starts towards him, cautiously, as if Merlin is made of explosives. At this point, he might as well be, magic old as time itself.  
  
This moment is private and the part of you that would have rejoiced to ruin it has long since shriveled in on itself. You turn your back as they embrace, a smile on your lips.  
  
.  
  
“War is coming, Arthur,” you tell him. “For the Once and Future King has risen again.”


End file.
